War­riors set record for as­sists in big NBA win

OAK­LAND, Cal­i­for­nia (AP): OLDEN STATE had a fran­chise-record 47 as­sists and used su­per­ac­cu­rate shooting to blast past the Los An­ge­les Lak­ers 149-106 on Wed­nes­day, led by Stephen Curry, who had 31 points with seven 3-point­ers and nine as­sists.

The War­riors’ 47 as­sists – on 53 bas­kets – are the most in the NBA this sea­son and two more than their pre­vi­ous record, set in 1994.

While a team record fell in Oak­land, a per­sonal mark was topped in Cleve­land as Kevin Love scored an NBA-best 34 points in the first quar­ter as the Cavaliers beat Port­land in a high-scor­ing en­counter.

Among other key re­sults, San An­to­nio ex­tended their win­ning streak to seven games by down­ing Char­lotte, and Toronto re­tained a share of the At­lantic Di­vi­sion lead by de­feat­ing Hous­ton.

Golden State’s Kevin Du­rant scored 28 as the War­riors found an as­ton­ish­ing first-half of­fen­sive flow to run away from un­der­manned Los An­ge­les.

Golden State had 26 as­sists on 29 bas­kets be­fore the break, as in sync as the War­riors have been since adding Du­rant dur­ing the off­sea­son and far bet­ter than when they took a 20-point beat­ing at Los An­ge­les less than three weeks ago.

GCAREER BEST

Rookie No. 2 over­all draft pick Bran­don In­gram scored a ca­reer-best 16 points in his first start for the Lak­ers, who had no an­swers de­fen­sively as Golden State shot 61.6 per cent with 19 3-point­ers.

Cleve­land’s 137-125 win against Port­land was set up by Love’s ex­tra­or­di­nary first quar­ter and a triple dou­ble from LeBron James.

Love, who fell three points shy of the league record of 37 for points in any quar­ter set by Golden State’s Klay Thomp­son two sea­sons back, made 11 of 14 field goal at­tempts, in­clud­ing 8 of 10 on 3-point­ers in the first quar­ter. He fin­ished with 40 points.

James had 31 points, 10 re­bounds and 13 as­sists for his sec­ond triple-dou­ble this sea­son. Golden State War­riors’ Stephen Curry (cen­tre) drib­bles be­tween Los An­ge­les Lak­ers’ Ti­mofey Moz­gov (20) and Lou Wil­liams (23) dur­ing the sec­ond half of a NBA bas­ket­ball game on Wed­nes­day night in Oak­land, Cal­i­for­nia. Golden State won 149-106.

His 44 ca­reer triple-dou­bles moved him past Guy Rodgers for 17th place on the ca­reer as­sist list. Cleve­land also set a fran­chise record with 20 3-point­ers.